CITIES & Exporting a BP

One of my best friends lives in Uruguay and LOVES my ball pythons. She can get normals there but there are currently no morph breeders in Uruguay. She wants an albino and I'd love to get her one for Christmas.

Do any of you know how to export an animal overseas? I know there's CITIES to reckon with but I don't know much about exportation laws. I also don't know much about Uruguay's importation laws but I figure if they have normal BPs there, it can't be too bad D=

Do you guys have any thoughts? Anyone with experience shipping internationally?

There is absolutely no way that you can get it to her by Christmas. You would first need an export permit, which will take you about a week or two to get. Then you would either have to apply for CITES, which could take from 6-9 months to get. Or, you could appply for your Master File and get a clone. That would probably take you about another 3-4 weeks to get. Once you have all of that, you will have to ship, which is going to cost you about $800, or up to $1350 if you are using a freight forwarder. If you were lucky enough to find someone already shipping to Uruguay, which is probably almost impossible, they may be able to piggy back your animal in the shipment, which isn't exactly legal, but some people might do it. Then once the animal is over there, your friend will more than likely have to pay a VAT tax on finish the receipt of the shipment (I have never shipped to Uruguay and don't know what there tax is, but a good number to use is 20%). Lastly, prior to any of that happening, your friend also has to have any type of Import permit that Uruguay requires.

Unfortunately, it isn't as easy as boxing it up, and shipping to your friend in "Minnesota". I hope that helped.